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Distracted Drivers Do More than Talk and Text According to AAA Survey

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A new AAA survey shows drivers who use their cell phones often may also be engaging in other risky behavior behind the wheel.

Just over half of the drivers who use a cell phone also admitted to sending a text or email behind the wheel. 65% say they speed, 44% drive drowsy and 29% do not use their seat belt according to the survey conducted by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety.

Jenny Robinson of AAA Mid-Atlantic says more than one in four young drivers admitted checking or updating social media behind the wheel.

Robinson says responding to the phone can become a habit; you hear the phone go off and you want to respond right away.  She says it’s better to put your phone on “silent” when you’re driving, so you don’t have that distraction.  The other option is to consider an app that will send an automatic response while you are driving.

Robinson says using a cell phone behind the wheel can quadruple your crash risk.

A Pennsylvania law that bans texting while driving took effect last March. Robinson says it does take some time to get awareness of new laws and to increase education about the dangers of this behavior.

 

AAA Study Finds Risk for Teen Drivers Rises with Number of Underage Passengers

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The risk of a teen being killed in a traffic crash rises with the number of young passengers according to a study by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety.   

The study says if a 16 or 17 year old driver adds one passenger under the age of 21,  the risk  increases by 44%. With two young passengers, the risk doubles and with three or more, it quadruples.

But Jenny Robinson of AAA Mid-Atlantic says carrying an adult passenger has the opposite effect. A teen driving with an adult age 35 and up has their risk factor reduced by 62%.

Pennsylvania’s new teen driver law limits the number of non-family young passengers for the first six months of driving.  Robinson says parents can impose their own limits for a longer period.

Robinson says parents should set the rules before they hand over the keys.  She says AAA has parent and teen driver contracts on their website.

Robinson says they’ve known for some time that having young passengers is a distraction for a teen driver, and this study really makes the risk clear.

Study Says First Month of “Solo” Driving Is a Risky Time For Teens

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Teens are 50% more likely to crash the first after they get their driver’s license than they are after a full year of driving on their own. That’s according to a study by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety.  Three common mistakes; failure to reduce speed, inattention and failure to yield account for 57% of those crashes

Jenny Robinson of AAA Mid-Atlantic says teen drivers have certain issues they face when they’re inexperienced. She says there are certain types of crashes that occur with relatively high rates in the first months of licensed teen driving, but once they gain experience, those crash rates decline quickly.  One example is crashes involving left hand turns; they are more common for teens during the first few months of driving.

Robinson suggests parents ride with their newly licensed teens as much as possible and use every teachable moment. That includes offering tips on the road when the parent is driving and the teen is the passenger.

Robinson says the more practice the better, the more teaching the better.  Currently, Pennsylvania requires teens to have 50 hours of behind the wheel training before getting their license. A bill recently passed by the legislature would increase that to 65 hours.

Robinson says driving is an acquired skill that gets better with experience.  She says the judgment is not always there with a new driver to determine how fast car is coming, how much time and care they need to allow when making a turn and what the stopping distance is when they have to make a sudden stop.

You can see the full study at AAAfoundation.org and also view videos of teen drivers behind the wheel taken as part of the study. Those videos captured a number of close calls likely due to inexperience behind the wheel.

Texting While Driving

AAA Asks Drivers To Take The Distraction Free Challenge

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The AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety is recognizing “Heads Up Driving Week” by asking people to take the distraction free driving pledge.  The fourth annual Traffic Safety Culture Index finds that 95% of drivers view texting or emailing by other drivers as a serious threat to their safety. However, 35% of drivers admit to reading or sending a text or email behind the wheel within the last month.

Jenny Robinson of AAA Mid-Atlantic says you can take the pledge by visiting AAAFoundation.org. She says everyone thinks it’s the “other person who doesn’t know how to drive safely while texting, but I do.”  She says that’s the attitude many people have, and AAA is trying to change it.

Robinson says 88% of drivers feel people talking on cell phones while driving are a serious threat to their safety, but 68% admit to talking and driving in the last month.  She says it’s another example of “do as I say, not as I do.”   

 Robinson says the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates over 54 hundred people were   killed in crashes that reportedly involved distracted driving in 2009. She says we see people using their cell phones while driving all the time.  She says it’s a little harder to quantify the full impact in the crash data.

Robinson says it’s so tempting to want to pick up the phone and read the text message when the phone goes off while you’re driving.  But she says please don’t do it, we know that it’s not safe.